Almost a Winchester
by lovelynoise
Summary: Adam's out of the cage, Emma didn't die. He is a boy without a past and she is a girl without a future. Both almost Winchesters, but not quite, what happens when their fates align?
1. A Girl Without a Future

She hadn't died. She hadn't died, but she might as well have. During her training, one thing had been more important than the rest. Complete your mission and return, or don't return at all, they told all the girls. Those words had been a part of her just as the combat preparation and the diet of blood and flesh. But she hadn't completed her mission. She had failed. And now she was banished. An outcast. Wanted by no one.

At the hospital they had been astonished by her quick healing. She rolled her eyes at the thought. They should have seen her growth spurt, that had been something to be truly astonished by. As an Amazon, she had gone from an infant to a teenager in just a few days. Not that it mattered now. She was an Amazon no more. She didn't dare to return, they would probably kill her if she did. "Probably". With one hundred percent certainty, more like it. The Amazons weren't known for their compassion or for giving second chances.

She'd walked out of the hospital later that night, had ripped the chords from her veins, knocked a woman unconscious and taken her clothes. No need to kill anyone anymore. No need to prove that she belonged – because she didn't. She didn't belong anywhere. Not with Amazons, not with humans. Not with the girls she'd for a week called sisters, not with the mother she'd known for a day, not with the father she'd seen for a few minutes. She had no family. She was alone. And to survive on her own, she had to be smart (a quality she suspected had come from her mother, given that her father had let her in to his room. Although he had been prepared with a knife, he hadn't been prepared to kill her. He had been too weak). She couldn't be weak. She had to stay strong. She would have been better off dead, but she wanted to live.

She couldn't attract any more attention to her. Not like at the hospital, where all the doctors and nurses had gathered to watch her. It had only been hours after the bullet had been removed that her body had started to heal. And those men had thought that a single gunshot could have killed her. Another sign of their questionable intelligence.

But they _had _won over her, a fact she couldn't ignore. She might not be allowed to call herself an Amazon anymore, but she still honored their rules. Fair is fair. They had won, she had lost. No need for vengeance. After all, half of the blood in her veins was the same as those men's. And that wasn't something to be ashamed of. The other girls killed lawyers and doctors. She'd had to face hunters. Not that an Amazon shouldn't be able to take care of two humans, but still. By almost killing her, they'd gained her respect. Which meant that she would stay out of their way.

She'd stay out of everyone's way, until she figured out what to do. For now, her new mission was to become invisible. No last name, no records, nothing. Given the fact that she technically didn't exist, that shouldn't be too hard.


	2. A Boy Without a Past

When he opened his eyes, he was surprised to see sunshine and blue sky. Why he was surprised he didn't know, but it was as if he'd never seen it before, even though he knew he had. Hell, yesterday had been sunny, hadn't it? He searched his mind for the memory, but it came up blank.

Yesterday. Where had he been? His body seemed to remember heat, but there were no images to accompany that sensation. The more he thought of it, the more the thought seemed to slip away, like a blurry dream. Perhaps it was all just a dream. Perhaps he was still asleep.

But no, the sun and sky seemed real enough. The ground under his feet was real, and so were the smell of nature and the sound of birds and cars in the distance. He didn't seem to know where he was, though – couldn't recognize any of it. The field of green grass seemed woke a strange déjà-vu feeling inside him, but he knew he had never seen it before. Or the trees, or the fence, or anything. There were no buildings close by, no people, no streets. The only thing was a road of pebbles. That didn't seem familiar either.

A breeze touched his body, and he realized he was naked. Well, more or less. The rags on his body didn't cover much – and on top of that, they were dirty and looked half-rotten. What the fuck had happened? He touched the rags with his hands, slightly disgusted. They smelled like a dead person.

He caught sight of his hands – his nail beds were covered with dirt as well, and the nails were long and frail. He'd never seen his hands like that before.

Realization.

He'd never seen his hands before.

He stared at them as the thought grew inside his mind. He didn't recognize his hands. He didn't recognize his body. He couldn't see his own face, but he was pretty sure that he wouldn't recognize that either.

Fuck.

He didn't know who he was.

He searched his mind for a last memory, for anything, but once again, it came up blank. Where there should be a lifetime of stories and images and feelings, there was only a void. Nothing.

He searched his pockets. But he didn't find any wallet, no photos, no ID, not even a stupid shopping list. The only thing was what might once have been a receipt, but it was in the same bad state as the clothes, and fell to pieces when he touched it.

He knew he probably should fall down and scream, maybe even cry, at the thought of not knowing who he was. Amnesia. That must be it, right? But it didn't scare him, not at all. Fact was, the only thing he felt was relief. The sun was shining on his pale, dirty skin, and he felt relieved. Free, somehow.

He started walking, heading for the pebbled road. He had never been more alone, more unsafe, more abandoned, and still, he had never felt better.


	3. Like Father, Like Daughter

Emma was hungry. Starving, as a matter of fact. She hadn't eaten anything but some Jell-O at the hospital, and that had been about as good as human flesh – a diet she'd never really gotten the hang of.

She'd been hitchhiking from Seattle and had come so far as Nampa, Idaho, before the driver's insinuations had been too much. She decided that if he was to stay alive, she had to get out – not that he deserved it, but after all, leaving a bloody trail after herself wasn't exactly inconspicuous.

She walked into a diner, scanning the booths to get a good one. She chose the one hidden in the corner, with a scrawny waiter no older than 16, his face covered with zits. She made a face, but quickly adjusted her features.

"Can I see the menu?" she asked and flashed a smile to the boy, the way the tribe had taught her. The boy cleared his throat and offered her a worn booklet with a shaky hand.

"Do you want anything to drink?" he asked, and his voice cracked a little.

"Water", she said without taking her eyes off the menu. There were so many things to choose from, she didn't even know where to start.

"Okay, I'll be right back."

She barely noted the boy leaving, her being so focused on the list of foods. Soup, pasta, meat, salads, hamburgers, pizza – she'd never seen anything like it. Being an Amazon, you kept a strict diet, but she no longer had to worry about that.

A clunky sound made her realize the boy was back with the glass of water. Probably the second one he had poured, judging by the look of his wet apron.

"Can I take your order?" he asked.

"Yes", she said. "I'll take the … hamburger. No, wait, the mushroom tortellini. … or maybe the pepperoni pizza?"

"A pepperoni pizza", the boy said and scribbled down her order on a notepad.

Something filled the air with a wonderful aroma, completely different from anything Emma had ever smelled before. It came from a plate another waiter was carrying to a table nearby.

"Wait", she said to the boy. "What's that?"

"Shepherd's pie", he answered after a quick glance. "It's from yesterday – Margie only makes it on Thursdays and Fridays."

"I want it", she decided.

"You sure? The pizza's better, we make it from scratch."

"No, I want the pie", Emma said. She felt her eyes flash, and the boy looked afraid for a second.

"Are … you okay?" he asked.

"I'm' fine", she smiled, forcing herself to calm down, and he seemed to decide he had only imagined it.

"Well, Shepherd's pie it is", he smiled gingerly back at her.

As he went away, she turned to look around her. The diner was small and shabby, and the only other people in there were middle-aged without any real purpose in life. On the wall there was a big map over the United States with a big red pin that said "You are here", which was stupid. Obviously people would know where they were, but the question was why.

She didn't have a real plan on where she was going and was only heading south because it felt right. All she knew was that she wanted to go somewhere warm and with lots of people so she could disappear in the crowd. She wasn't sure if she really liked being that unstructured, but if she was to become invisible, being plan-less was good. If _she _didn't know where she was going, how could anyone else?

The boy returned with a plate containing the steaming pie.

"Here you go", he said and put it down.

"Thanks", she said and put a piece of pie to her mouth.

"Let me know if you need anything else", he said.

The taste of pie exploded in her mouth and all of her other senses were temporarily paralyzed. A sound escaped her lips that made the boy blush.

"Good?" he asked and she nodded without answering. He took the hint and left to greet some other guests. She'd have liked to enjoy the pie for as long as possible, but she didn't like the idea of staying in one place for any longer than 30 minutes, so she shuffled it down and then waved for the boy to come over.

"I'll have the rest to go", she said.

He looked at her plate. "There's nothing left", he pointed out.

Rolling her eyes, she said: "The rest of the pie. All you have. I want it."

"Oh. Okay. I'll go fix it."

When he returned a few minutes later with a stuffed brown paper bag, she gave him that smile she knew would have him weak for days. On the table she put a few of the dollar bills she'd taken from the truck driver while he was busy staring at her chest.

"Keep the change", she said, and with the bag in her hand, she left the diner. The bag somehow made her happier – like it was an anchor holding her down, making her real. Like she actually was a person, and not some creature who'd only been alive for a week or two. Liking pie wasn't something the tribe had taught her. It was a quality of her own, something that defined her and no one else. She liked it, liked the idea of forming an identity independent of everything before. Maybe she didn't have to be completely invisible. Maybe there was hope after all.


	4. All those who wander are lost

_All those who wander are not lost. _

Well, he was wandering, and he was definitely lost.

It was one of those things he'd thought at first was a memory, something that would reveal something about his past. But it had only turned out to be a quote from Tolkien, an author he had the strangest feeling he liked, which didn't help at all. Even though he knew nothing about himself, he knew that most people liked Lord of the Rings.

He had had a few of those false flashbacks, that had turned out to be nothing. Hearing a tune and be told it was the sound played at hockey arenas; recognizing a face in the news, only to realize it was the President. The sense of freedom was slowly turning into some sort of imprisonment – if you didn't know who you were, there wasn't much you could do.

He had found out that the place where he'd woken up was called Stull Cemetery in Kansas. According to Wikipedia (another thing he remembered), there were several urban legends about it, claiming that it was the Gate to Hell and that it was connected with the Devil. Two people had gone missing there before, but it had turned out one had been burnt to death and the other had probably killed himself. Once again, nothing that helped him.

He'd gone to the police, but they'd disregarded him as some crazy person obsessed with the occult and told him to go away before they arrested him. He'd left the place as soon as possible – after stealing some clothes hanging out to dry and then taking some of the tip at a restaurant when no one was looking. He felt bad about it, but not as bad as if the police had at least tried to help him.

By bus, he'd gone to Topeka, a city 30 minutes away and walked into the Police Station. This time, he hadn't told them about his amnesia, but instead asked to see the files over missing persons. There had mostly been children, but not even a single description that could belong to himself. After that, he decided that the best thing he could do was to go to a hospital. There they'd believe him, at least.

Somehow, seeing doctors and nurses in their scrubs made him calm. They were there to help, not to blame.

"Can I help you?" a nurse behind the desk asked as he walked in.

"Um, yes …", he said. "I think I suffer from amnesia."

"Well, fill in this form and sit down, and we'll help as soon as we can", the woman said and handed him a piece of paper and a pen. It said things as _patient's name, social security number, insurance details, relatives, medical history _and so on.

"Um, that's the thing", he said. "I can't … cause I don't remember." He lowered his voice, knowing how crazy he sounded. "I don't know who I am."

The nurse finally looked at him. "Oh", she said. "Well, sit down and I'll call for someone straight away."

Only a few minutes later, a tall man with a doctor's robe and a stethoscope around his neck, offered him his hand.

"I'm Dr. Murray, neurologist", he said. "And you are the boy who don't remember who you are, is that right?"

He nodded.

"Well, we're going to help you", the doctor said with a warm smile. "If you would come here with me."

As they walked through the corridor, the man continued speaking. "Do you remember anything? A name, a phone number, a street that feels familiar?"

He shook his head. "No. Nothing."

"Don't worry", the doctor said and put a hand on his shoulder. "We'll take care of it, I promise. If you would just go in here", he said and pointed to a big white room. "Kate here is going to take care of you." A woman in her thirties smiled at him.

"Now, I'm going to book the MRI and some other machines for you, while Kate here does some standard tests. Then I'll be back to ask some more questions. Okay?"

"Okay", he nodded, glad not to have to worry anymore. Everything would be fine.

He stripped out of the stolen clothes and put on the hospital robes. The nurse took some blood samples, measured his pulse, listened to his heart and did about every other test there was. He was surprised to learn that his body seemed to know what the nurse was doing, as if he'd spent half his life in and out of hospitals. Or maybe he'd just watched too much of Grey's Anatomy.

When the nurse went away with all the samples, he fell asleep. His dreams were dark and cloudy and without any real content, just like his life. When he woke up, the room was darker and the blinds closed, and the nurse stood beside him, putting him on a drip.

"What's that?" he asked.

"Saline. You're dehydrated and malnourished", she answered. That might have been true, if he hadn't somehow recognized the word on the non-descriptive plastic bag. Midazolam. That was a sedative drug. How he knew that he wasn't sure, but he knew the nurse was lying.

"Now, just leave it in and try to sleep. Dr. Murray had to be in on a very urgent surgery, but he will continue to treat you tomorrow."

He nodded and closed his eyes, pretending to go back to sleep, but as soon as the nurse left the room, he ripped the drip from his arm with a prayer that it wasn't too late. He felt a bit sleepy, but that might as well be because of his rather hectic day.

He wasn't sure what was going on, but he didn't really want to stay to find out. He changed back into his stolen clothes and caught a glance of his charts at the end of his bed. Curiously, he opened it. The records stated that he'd gotten _Sodium Chloride for IV Injection_. Not a single note on the Midazolam. A bit further up, next to _Patient's Name_, it said _John Doe_. He made a face at the name for some reason. Next to it, circled with a red marker, it said _NO RELATIVES, _as if that was the most important thing of all. Okay, that was it, he needed to get out of there. Clearly everyone in the state of Kansas was a lunatic.

Slowly and quietly he opened the door, trying to remember his way back down the hall. The desk where the nurse had been seated was empty and dark, and he sighed of relief.

Next thing he knew, there was a strong hand on his shoulder, keeping him from going anywhere.

"Where do you think you're going?" Dr. Murray asked.

"Home. I feel better now", he lied. "My name's JD … Smith and I remember everything."

"Is that so?" the doctor asked.

"Yes. Stupid mistake", he said. "My friends and I were drunk, and I clearly had a bit too much. Won't happen again, I swear." He tried to get loose from the man's grip, but it seemed impossible.

"And where are you from?" doctor Murray wanted to know.

"Stull. It's really close, so I figured I might as well go home. You know, medical bills are no fun", he laughed nervously.

"JD Smith from Stull", the man said, his fingers digging deeper into the boy's shoulder. "Now, that's a lie if I ever heard one. We ran your DNA, you know, and apparently you've been dead for over two years. Isn't that interesting, _Adam?_"

"I don't know what you're talking about", he said.

"Oh, I think you do. But do you know what's even more interesting?" the man, who clearly wasn't a doctor, asked. "The man who's stated to be your father. _John. Winchester._" The fingers dug even deeper.

"Clearly, your brothers thought themselves clever when they sent you here. But there are a lot of things your brothers don't know, like how we keep track of everyone who's ever gotten a measles shot, for example. And I'm sad to say that you won't be able to tell them, either."

Brothers. A father named John. Him being named Adam. Officially dead for two years. But as he looked at the man, he realized that wasn't his biggest problem. The doctor's face changed, grew bigger somehow, bigger than what should be possible.

He was going to die. He knew it. The sensation of doom felt oddly familiar.

But then he realized something, saw his rescue only inches away. A fire alarm on the wall, the kind where you crash the glass and all hell breaks loose. While the creature in front of him was still transforming, Adam forced his elbow through the glass and a deafening sound was heard. The man's grip loosened, and Adam ran without looking back. Soon water fell from the ceiling and patients and staff came out, filling the halls. In the panic that followed no one noticed when the boy in too big clothes ran out to the parking lot and disappeared into the dark.


	5. Revelation

Emma was heading for Phoenix. No particular reason for it, other than it being warm and that she liked the name. Phoenix. It was supernatural, just like her. (She might be working on becoming invisible, but that didn't have to mean being ordinary.) At first she'd been thinking about Los Angeles, but for some reason she didn't think that angels would care too much about what happened to her. After all, she didn't care about what happened with the angels. She knew they were no longer the biggest and the baddest out there – there was something new, something she knew she should stay away from. Another thing to stay invisible from.

The glass walls of the bus stop was under the attack of an hailstorm but she tried to forget that as she opened the brown paper bag, inhaled the fumes and stuffed her mouth full with the baked piece of wonder. It might have gotten cold since she'd bought it a few hours earlier, but it was still as delicious (better than Shepherd's Pie, even). Apple pie – the best invention on earth. Maybe humans were good for something, after all.

That didn't mean she wanted to get to know any, however. Not humans in general, and especially not men_. _Particularly not too old men on a crowded bus. They thought that a pretty face and a smile gave them the right to behave like … well, like men. Staring and whistling and shouting and touching, they never ceased to annoy her. (The touchers soon learned their lessons, though. The other ones she tried to ignore, muttering her mantra: _invisible, invisible, invisible._) Nah, she preferred being on her own.

That's why she'd come up with the great idea of driving herself. It wouldn't be very difficult (after all, humans did it) and she would never have to sit next to a sweaty middle-aged ape again, 'accidently' nudging her thigh with his moist palms. Well, at least not after one of them had taught her _how _to drive.

It pleased her, having some sort of plan, some goal in life other than being invisible, even though it meant that she was in the middle of nowhere, along Route 96. What didn't please her was the weather, though. Early March in Utah was about fifty degrees too cold for her liking, and she tucked her stolen leather jacket a bit closer around the neck. She'd been waiting here for a while, but it was because she didn't want just any car, had no use for an SUV with a suburban family inside it. She wanted someone who wouldn't mind teaching her how to drive, someone who'd stop to pick up a stranger. Someone who'd do anything for a smile and a pretty face. Someone like …

She smiled and opened up her jacket (even though that meant exposing her chest to the cold, scratching hail. We all had to make sacrifices now and then) just a bit as a red old car came closer. The vehicle (A Chrysler Eagle, early 90's, she recognized. Not a car the Amazons would have looked twice at, because it most definitely didn't belong to the kind of men they wanted) slowed down, revealing a young man behind the steering wheel. The window was rolled down, and the man leaned closer. With ginger hair and pale freckle-covered skin, he looked like the easily-manipulated kind.

"Do you need a ride?" he asked. She shook her head, which made his eyebrows furrow. They were as ginger as the rest of his hair.

"No", she answered and looked at him the way she knew would make him fall for her instantly. "I want to drive."

This time, the man's brows disappeared under the orange curls. "You want to drive my car?"

"Yes", she nodded. "Would you mind?"

For a moment it seemed as if the answer would be yes, but then the young man shook his head.

"N-no." He got out of the car, fumbling with the handle, and let her in, before he ran around the front and got in on the other side. She could have driven away if she wanted to (and had known how to), and it annoyed her to find how naïve this man – or boy, really – was. How easy it was for her, or anyone, to use this naivety, to shamelessly take advantage of the situation. Oh, well. Humans weren't very intelligent, that was for sure.

"I'm Aiden, by the way." He smiled hesitantly and reached his arm forward. For a moment she thought he was going to try touching her, and she could feel her eyes flash. Then she realized he was only offering her his hand.

She shook it briefly and met his gaze a little longer than necessary. "I'm Emma. Now, how do you drive this thing?"


	6. Maybe it runs in the family

Even if you've forgotten everything you've ever known, there are some things you still have imprinted in your mind. Like, if a giant man-eating monster tries to kill you, you run as far away as possible and you don't stop until there's no chance of them finding you ever again. Adam hadn't stopped running until finding the bus station, where he'd used the last of his stolen change and gotten on the first bus out of town. However, he'd only gotten to Kansas City, which didn't seem far away enough, since anything in the _same state _was too close. So, in K.C., he had committed his second criminal offence in a week, and stolen a credit card from a drunk guy in a bar. With that card, Adam had bought the closest departing train ticket available, which had taken him to Oklahoma City. He still didn't feel safe, but he realized there was no point in running until he actually had found out _what _he was running from. So, after cashing out all the money from the credit card (320 dollars) and checking in on the cheapest motel available, he hit the library, where Google (another thing he remembered) informed him that John Winchester was one unlucky son of a bitch.

The entire family seemed to be haunted by death and misfortune. John's wife, Mary, had been killed in a fire when she was only 28 years old, and John himself had died after being fatally injured in a car accident. Maybe that had been for the best, though, seeing as how their sons, Dean and Samuel, had been going on some Bonny-and-Clyde-tour, involving bank robbery, murders and various innumerable crimes, only to be shot to death by the police. Happy family. Adam wasn't too sure if he still could blame that thing for wanting to kill him – with relatives like that (and the fact that he couldn't even remember anything from his life), it seemed rather likely that he was guilty in one way or another. Although, guilty or not, and regardless of his memory loss, none of that explained WHAT exactly that thing had been. Because there was no such thing as monsters, right? Maybe that sedative had been some sort of hallucinogen, causing him to see things. Though, no matter how much he wanted to believe that, he knew there was no logical explanation to what he'd seen, other than that of monsters actually being real. Which wasn't very comforting.

So, instead of thinking about monsters, he turned to another mystery – himself. He'd found no records of anyone named Adam Winchester, dead or alive. However, given the fact that John's wife Mary had died in 1983, and Adam estimating his own age to no more than 22, 23, tops, there was the possibility of him having another mother and another last name. Great. He'd just put that into the search engine and hope for some good luck, because this family seemed to have such an extensity of that.

But at least now he had a mission – to find out who he was and why those things were after him. Hopefully without dying, even though that seemed to be the family tradition.


End file.
